Once fully back on active duty, Zidarov tied up a few loose ends. He made sure that Elina had got her funds from the rejuve-trader. He went on trips up to the suborbitals, to check that the warehouses in Section E were all now stacked with traceable goods of mostly legal provenance. As Vongella had told him, some of the buildings had been quite energetically destroyed, including Warehouse 94, which was now a patchwork of slowly smouldering steel struts.

He visited Borodina, who had also resumed her work. They met up at her new patch, one that overlooked the dreary lands where Mordach, they said, still lived and brooded.

‘Feeling better?’ she asked him, as they sheltered from the rain in a watch-station refec-chamber.

‘Everything hurts. How about you?’

‘Much the same.’

‘Working on the Vidora?’

‘I’m a liability with them now, I think.’

‘Sorry about that.’

‘Don’t be. I’ve got plenty to keep me occupied.’ She gave him a significant look. ‘For some reason, the veil records, the ones I was sure had been cracked, they never made it out of ­Analysis. So I’m still cleared for access.’

‘Good. I never doubted it.’

They talked some more. Bastion gossip, mostly. When he rose to leave, she looked up at him. ‘So,’ she asked, impishly. ‘How’s it going?’

He winced. ‘What a stupid question, probator,’ he said. ‘Just as always, everything’s going absolutely fine.’

And after that he had to turn his attention to new cases. They kept on coming in – violence in the underground warrens beneath the Ghallek industrial complex, a spate of ritual murders centred around the disused cathedral of Saint Petrov Martyr, large-scale weapon-smuggling rumours involving the Chakshia cartel. There would be plenty to keep him occupied. It was while pursuing one of these that he came across a dataslug in his personal equipment locker, one that he knew he hadn’t put there himself. He took it, and headed out of the Bastion, driving to a place where he was sure he wouldn’t be disturbed.

Then he turned the engine off, and activated the slug. An audex recording of Udmil’s voice started up immediately.

‘Some things you should know, Probator Zidarov,’ she said, perfunctory as ever. ‘Your information was of value. I cannot tolerate deception, especially from those few I have permitted to share in my confidence. You were right about Avro, and he has now paid the penalty for his lies. The Jazc Corporation is under my sole control, including selected assets from the old Terashova Combine. I plan to run it more efficiently than he did. I shall not be employing off-worlders. They are but one step away from xenos, in my view, and should never have been tolerated in the first place.’

Zidarov smiled to himself. Nothing had changed to make her more agreeable.